January ROCK Launch Photos

A comfortable temperature, clear skies, and, for the first couple of hours, no wind at all, the weather was as close to perfect for rocket launching as I’ve ever seen.

Carl launched his SpaceX Falcon which he had built the previous night.

Other than the parachute not opening, the rocket turned in a perfect flight.

The lack of wind encouraged me to load a G motor into my clone of the Estes Shadow instead of an F. The rocket flew straight up trailing a stream of black smoke. The seven-second delay was just a bit too long, but close enough. The yellow parachute filled with air and the rocket floated gently to earth, landing in the adjacent field.

Many really nice scale models were flown including this Gemini Titan on a cluster of two motors.

A cricket took flight in the payload section of a rocket after receiving a friendly bon voyage from a couple of young ladies.

Carl’s Delta IV heavy turned in a slightly squirrely flight as one of the motors ignited a second late.

This isn’t one of the better photos I took – the rocket is out of focus. But, I got a chuckle out of the kids in the background.

Chris took the microphone to count down to the launch of his Pigsus … “oink oink oink … oink oink … oink … OINK”

We had a large turn-out for the launch. So the pads filled quickly between each round of flights.